My latest wins from creative comps

First of all, I was the lucky winner of the Kurt Geiger Instagram competition I blogged about in September. You had to make an Instagram video of your favourite Kurt Geiger shoes on your street, and tag it #whichstyleisupyourstreet. I had some really good ideas for this (I wanted to include Brighton beach, the pier and the big wheel) but unfortunately left entering to the last minute and couldn’t get a cameraman to help me. In this case, the winner was randomly chosen and as there was only one other entry (at least that I could find on the hashtag search – Instagram search can be very unreliable!), I still felt I should have a go – I ended up making this simple video with my favourite pink KG heels, and was very excited to get a winning comment from @KurtGeiger.

Instagram tip: one of my blog readers did three great entries for this, but had her account set to private so the promoter would never have seen them; make sure you don’t make the same mistake! You can find out more about Instagram in the free guide I’ve written at the Compers News website

Here are the dreamy shoes I won, worth £850 in total – wow!

Next I entered the Green Giant recipe/photo competition on their Facebook page – create a sensational salad using any Green Giant product. I knew most people would use sweetcorn so decided to buy artichoke hearts instead. I mixed these with chickpeas, rocket and red onion, olive oil and lemon juice then topped it with a Moroccan spiced mackerel fillet. I was pretty pleased with the resulting dish and photo – as far as salads go, this one was filling and the artichokes were much tastier than I expected.

My photo was chosen as the first runner up and I’ve won a fabulous Kitchenaid blender. This competition had less than 30 entries and with 3 prizes to be won, that’s great odds of winning – the promoter has ended up with negative feedback from some entrants though, as they didn’t publish all the entries in the Facebook gallery and it’s not clear whether all of them were judged fairly.

Facebook tip: don’t leave it to the last couple of days to enter a ‘gallery’ based Facebook or website competition where entries require approval, as you’ll panic that they won’t approve/publish your photo in time for the judging. Where entries are instantly public and timestamped, such as Twitter, Instagram or Facebook timeline posts – you can leave it as late as you dare!

I joined Jackpot Joy a while ago because they run a lot of member-only promotions, so when I saw their photo challenge to send in your best gameshow pose I couldn’t resist. They generously gave away twenty prizes in total, and my “Countdown” themed pose won me a Nikon Coolpix camera. I bought this pink puffball dress for £10 in a fancy dress hire shop a few years back and it’s been brilliant for any 80s – or pink! – themed comps. Mind you, it IS getting tighter with each outing. Ahem.

My next big win came in a Pinterest competition hosted by McArthurGlen Designer Outlets. They were giving away £500 to spend at each of their Outlets – having recently moved away from the East Midlands, I entered for Bridgend which is just down the road from my Mum’s house and has some excellent shops (Vans and Gap in particular!). Competition entry sounded simple but wasn’t – you had to repin the competition pin from the relevant Outlet board (easy), then create a board of Autumn/Winter fashions from the McArthurGlen Lookbook on the website, then enter your board URL and details via Facebook. However, I couldn’t get the Pin It button to work properly and ended up having to screen grab the individual items and add the web address manually. I also noticed that a lot of the other entrants hadn’t done what was requested, and had pinned items that weren’t from the Lookbook. There were less than 20 entries for the Bridgend outlet, and I got a winning email on Thursday – very handy as we were down in Wales this weekend visiting Mum. I collected my prize and managed to get a pair of Vans for all the family for £75, and these gorgeous Yo Gabba Gabba ones are going into the Christmas box for Ry! I treated Rob to a couple of shirts and am saving the rest of the £500 for the January sales.

Pinterest Tip: Enter at the last minute – if you do your board early, the compers that follow you will wonder what comp you’re entering and join in, making it not-so-low entry! You can always set your entry to Secret and make it public on the closing date.

These four wins – in recipe, photo, Pinterest and video promotions – are a reminder of why we should all be searching for and entering more low-entry effort comps. I definitely find that an hour devoted to a single creative competition can be much more worthwhile than an hour entering 100 prize draws – and it’s also hugely enjoyable!

Here are a few of my tips for finding and winning creative comps:

• Search on Twitter and Google for ‘photo competition’, ‘Pinterest competition’, ‘Instagram competition’ etc. I often search Twitter on my iPhone whilst out and about, then email myself the best comps, or ‘Favorite’ them to add to my ‘Comps to do’ list later.
• On Pinterest, follow lots of compers. A recent Pinterest update means that when the people you follow create new boards, you can get a notification – you can be certain most of these boards are competition entries, so it’s a great way of finding out what comps are out there.
• Read the T&Cs carefully before entering – it may be a video competition, but if the winner is drawn at random you don’t need to spend hours creating something Oscar-winning.
• Search on the Twitter/Instagram hashtag or check the Facebook gallery for entries so far – I tend to do my entries in the last couple of days so I can see what I’m up against first.
• Choose comps with restrictions which will lower entry numbers. eg. for the Designer Outlet one, you had to collect your prize from the Outlet, and with Kurt Geiger you needed to own a pair of their shoes. It’s no good if you don’t have the specific product of course – but if you DO, then you have a big advantage over most other prospective entrants and it’s worth finding time to enter!
• Enjoy the entry process – every time you take a photo, make a video or create a Pinterest board you’re learning, becoming more confident and can use your experiences to win more creative comps in future.

If you want to have a go at some creative comps, there are some great ones on my Halloween linky, which I’ll be adding to all the time over the next fortnight – have fun!